Mechanical Router and Raccoon Infestation

Finally settling into home...and it smells really bad! A raccoon has taken residence in our barn during our travels and we (Brent) had to dismantle it's nest today, a bit sad but a lot less sickening with it gone. Now that I talked about the most rural thing in our lives...I will talk about the least rural thing in our lives! EMPAC! I know, I know, I keep talking about how wonderful this place is but...Brent was away up at the magical world of EMPAC before our dismantling of Gravity down in Kentucky and this time they let him use a bunch of machines! Brent used a mechanical router to make these beautiful phonograph horns (pictured below!). He actually used the way he traditionally makes a lot of sculptures (the gluing and stacking of wood which is then ground down into his trademark thin, spindly shapes) but this time someone programmed the delicate shape he wanted into a computer and a router carved out these thin sculptures all by itself!

When I first saw Brent's frame by frame animations (film still below) that had traditional hand drawn images with old school panes of glass adding depth, mixed with the precision of a digital camera allowing for a controlled in-camera editing & his trademark flickering light, I was completely stunned by the way he created his own style of extremes- sort of a neo-antiquity or a DIY-technology feel- so unbelievable and unlike anything I'd seen before! This mechanical wood carving thing brings a whole new dimension to what he is doing, making the possibilities seem endless....and THAT is why I love EMPAC! This is an essay contest on why I love EMPAC, right?

O, great, I just heard the raccoon looking for his home...maybe we need to rebuild Leonard's house as a wildlife santuary to encourage said wildlife to move out of our own house?